"The old Mormon culture, the thing that first
lifted our community up and held it together
for so long, all this new money is killing it."
The 80-year-old Kirkland strolls into the
parlor of his house from the kitchen, where
the newer of his two wives is making lunch.
A Methodist from Georgia, he converted to
Mormonism in 1941, then relocated to Utah
with his wife, Mary, a year later. Since 1952
he has been a polygamist. His second wife,
Sylvia, hails from a town to the east. "Those
hills over there are still full of 'poligs' [as he
calls polygamists], and when I met Sylvia and
picked her out as wife number two, Mary
never made a fuss. She knew it was the will
of God, and I've had an unusually fruitful life
because of it."
Kirkland shows me a photograph of his 18
children and 98 grandchildren. "I've had
four more grandkids since this was
snapped," he says, his hand stroking a white
haired woman at the picture's center. "This
is Mary; she died a few years ago," he says.
"I miss her very much."
He tilts the photo against a chair and
stands back to regard it. "This has been my
life's work," he says scratching his thick gray
beard. "Of course, my choice to remain a
polygamist split me from the church. They
excommunicated me, so I no longer practice
the religion today's so-called Mormons fol
low. They passed the manifesto to outlaw
polygamy so they could become a state and
join the union and make money. I tell you,
it's the love of money that drives this
place now."
NationalGeographic,January1996